The present invention relates to flexible circuits and more particularly to flexible circuits and flexible circuit boards having an integral heater.
Flexible circuits are being employed increasingly to improve the architecture of modern high density electronic circuitry and in the form of ribbon conductors to interconnect parts movable with respect to one another. As complexity and thus density of packaging of circuits increases, the problems of miniaturizing interconnection devices without sacrificing reliability of the interconnection becomes increasingly difficult. As printed circuit boards and electrical connectors become smaller, the ability to securely grasp a connecting board or base member and to hold them in the face of vibration, expansion and contraction in the presence of heat and cold, creep and the like becomes a mechanical problem requiring in many instances rather elaborate, albeit quite small, mechanical devices which at best only mitigate the problems. Even so the connectors remain a size-bulk problem and securing them to delicate printed circuit boards is still another and even greater problem.